


i'm not the coolkid

by spacepuck (orphan_account)



Category: Homestuck
Genre: Gen, Sadstuck, post-homestuck
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-01-21
Updated: 2012-01-21
Packaged: 2017-10-29 21:47:35
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,702
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/324507
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/spacepuck
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Dave reflects on his life and brother, post-game.</p>
            </blockquote>





	i'm not the coolkid

I didn’t know what to do after the incident.

I didn’t know where to go. All roadways were blocked off, all possibilities shrouded by thick clouds of doubt and uncertainty. Suffocating reminders coiled around my legs and dragged me down, down down down, until the ground swallowed me and I had to stop struggling or else all of the rocks made of memories would fall on top of my head and knock me unconscious, only for me to wake up later and start the process again.

I could only move in the tight circle that had encased itself around me, and I would turn and turn and turn and feel uneasy every time my toes went over the edge. My heart would begin to thud and I would stop for ten, twenty, thirty minutes at a time. I would be frozen.

The clock would continue to tick.

Time wouldn’t stop for me anymore.

Sometimes I wonder why I’m here. Here, in this empty room, this quiet office, this lonely place. Had the circumstances been different, the room would be loud with sick beats, the office a mess and this place another item to control in my hands. But I can’t anymore. The will is gone. The lyrics have dissipated. I am just a sad extended note on this dark record that will never stop turning.

That was kind of poetic. Let me write that down.

Okay.

This piece of shit pen is almost dead.

People didn’t know what happened to me during the game. That fucking game that I never wanted to play. Everyone thought I had gone back to my game-addict days, playing for hours never stopping gotta keep going don’t stop until I win, but…

…well. That’s not entirely false. It’s not like I could have just stepped out of the game. It’s not like I could have popped out the disc and put it away and never look at it again. Not like I had to watch everything fall apart around me.

Except that’s exactly what happened. I couldn’t stop because the game wouldn’t let me, not until I was finished. I had to watch everything shake and drop to the ground in an un-cool and lack-of-sick-rhyme-and-beat way. I wasn’t in the same world anymore. There was no way to get back without winning.

While I was in there, inside the game, apparently I had never actually moved from my home. It was like a copy of me – my soul, my mind, I guess – went into the game while the physical me stayed. I was on autopilot. Got food when I needed it. Pissed when I had to. But never actually interacted with, saw, or heard the world I was physically sitting in.

I can’t believe I got myself wrapped up in it.

Got so wrapped up I couldn’t see anything around me.

Couldn’t fucking notice when something was wrong.

Didn’t even know when…

God damn it.

When I had to go to court so some shitty relative I’ve visited twice and never really spoken to could have custody of me, I couldn’t pay attention. I knew that my aunt what’s-her-face would win the custody because she’s the only relative that wants me and, hell, is probably the only one that even knows about my existence. But I still doubt how relative she is to my family. Yeah, sure, I’ve seen the legal documents – she’s my dad’s older sister. Whoever the fuck my dad was.

Here’s the thing: I’ve always doubted my parent’s existence. Even before the game, Bro never talked about them, never showed pictures, never gave any hint that they were ever a part of his or my life. It was only after my aunt brought me to her place for the first time in what she said was twelve years (I guess she was counting, maybe she does care) that I saw my parents for the first time.

My mom was the one with blonde hair. She had a bright smile and looked like every other mom I’ve ever seen on the planet. Thankfully, she didn’t look entirely like Rose’s mom – her hair was too straight and she didn’t wear lipstick and she was too unstylish to be Ms. Lalonde, thank god. From what I gathered, she was the outdoorsy kind of mom. Maybe the “soccer mom” type, except instead of soccer it was sword fighting or some shit.

And then there was dad. Dad had darker hair, not brown exactly but darker than blonde (what the fuck kind of shade is that?), and… Well, otherwise he looked like Bro. Aside from the button-up shirt and the lack of shades and the small amounts of scruff, it was clear that Bro was related.

…And, I suppose, looking at my mom, I was related, too.

I still have difficulty believing they were ever real, despite the amount of photos and documents and stories that Aunt Lisa fed me. I listened and saw, but that’s all it was to me – a picture book of memories that will never be mine and will forever be another mystery to my hippocampus.

This pen is seriously a piece of shit, but I can’t find another one.

It was weird leaving my piece of crap apartment forever. I collected what I needed, and then some. I couldn’t leave Bro’s stuff behind to be either sold or thrown away. Not his swords, not his stupid smuppets, not his extra pairs of ridiculously cool (ironically cool) anime shades, and…

I couldn’t leave Lil’ Cal behind, no matter how creepy the little bastard was.

There was no will stating I could have these things. Bro would only do that *~*ironically*~* and only if he knew that he was going to…

Fuck.

I keep his things at the top part of my closet at my aunt’s home, on this shelf that would probably snap if I added one more smuppet or sword. I would make it a romantic shrine and shit, but my irony levels have been dangerously low since I came back to the real world. What was once the thing that would differentiate me from some other cool blonde kid with shades and a red shirt is now something I don’t want to have to deal with any more. I don’t want to force myself to be cool. I don’t want to try and impress anyone and at the same time pretend I don’t give a shit about a word they say. I don’t want to be ironic for a while. Only for a while.

Lil’ Cal sits with all of Bro’s records on the other side of my room. I couldn’t sleep for some odd number of nights because of the thing’s staring. It never became normal, but rather just routine.

I would try to listen to his records, but after the first minute I’d shut the player off. Every single one of them. The wound was still too fresh and too familiar. The music would flow inside and sting and mess with my nerves and send pangs of pain regret to my brain and I would need to stop before it got too severe.

I can’t tell if it’s getting better. I don’t think it is, really. Whenever I think it is I just think back to how badly that game fucked me up.

Let me tell how badly that game fucked me up.

I will say one thing and one thing only about what fucked me up more than anything.

It wasn’t Bec Noir.

It wasn’t the fact that my best friend in the entire fucking world almost died because of some bitch’s cheating trick.

It wasn’t the fact that I myself almost died.

And it wasn’t any of that other bullshit that happened.

It was the fact that Bro.

Bro really.

He’s really.

Oh, fuck.

I can’t.

I need to put this pen down.

It’s dying anyway.

It’s fucking dead.

I can’t tell this story.

I’m so sorry.

I can’t say it, Bro.

I can’t admit it. I can’t write it down, I can’t say it out loud.

I can’t fucking rhyme without you sitting around.

And I know I’m an asshole kid, and I know I’m a brat.

But this isn’t working, you don’t got my back.

Fuck these rhymes, they aren’t sick, they’re fucking shit.

I can’t…

I can’t admit to all the wrongs I commit.

I know I’ve lied, I know I’ve sneaked,

I know I’ve tried to steal your beats.

But worst of all, my worst crime of all.

I wasn’t there

to

see you

fall.

…

Bro.

I hope you can hear me.

In some insane other after-life that you never really believed in.

I wasn’t there the night it happened. I didn’t answer the calls. I didn’t arrive at the wake or the funeral. I didn’t know how you…

…you died…

until I got home. Home from the game and back into reality. The reality of an empty, quiet home. Back into the reality of a lonely city. I thought it was just the game, I thought that’s what was supposed to happen. I know it sounds childish, but. I couldn’t wait to fucking come home again. I wanted to see you. I didn’t want to believe you really died. I didn’t want to believe you sacrificed yourself for one last battle.

I still don’t want to believe it.

I need to put this pen down right now.

The inks running and I don’t know if it’s even readable anymore.

But who would want to read this.

I’m just a stupid boy with stupid emotions. Stupid emotions and stupid feelings and I just feel so fucking stupid.

I didn’t know what to do after I heard because I was scared. I was so fucking afraid that it was true. What the hell was I supposed to do? “oh the only person that actually wanted to watch after me and gave a shit about me is fucking dead? oh okay.”

Fuck.

Coolkids don’t get scared. Coolkids don’t cry. Coolkids don’t feel emotions.

Fuck being a coolkid.

I’m Dave Strider.

My Bro is dead.

And I am the most sorry and regretful and _stuck_ I’ve ever been.


End file.
